— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

"Attention Gigafloat," boomed the voice of Vice Admiral Joseph Krane as the fleet steamed into position, "the Earth Alliance Navy demands your immediate surrender of all weapons, equipment, and personnel aboard your platform. If you do not comply, we will open fire."

As expected, the response came in the form of artillery fire from a small army of outdated mobile suits standing at the platform's edge and hovering in the air above it. The shells splashed down uselessly in front of the fleet. Admiral Krane smiled. Now he wouldn't have his nice glorious battle taken from him.

"Admiral, Gigafloat's mobile suits are moving towards us," one of the deckhands reported.

"Just as I thought," he chuckled, and took up the intercom again, keying in another frequency. "Captain Danilov. Begin your approach. All mobile suit units, take off; all warships, lay down cover fire and advance to Point Theta. Commence the attack!"

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The Charlemagne quaked under a near miss from an exploding missile, and Ivan Danilov cast his eyes towards the vast expanse of Gigafloat below. The Resistance's mobile suits had already taken off, and the Windams were already inexorably pushing them back— and those left on the platform would be no match for the Charlemagne's firepower.

"Captain," the weapons officer said, "we're in firing range."

So that was it. Danilov spared Gigafloat one more look and hoped someone had had the foresight to evacuate the innocent.

"Very well. Open fire."

Again the ship rattled, as its railguns and beam cannons let loose a wall of firepower that slammed headlong into the platform. Mobile suits vanished in a vast plume of fire and the Charlemagne angled its bow up, the cannon in its center glowing with gathering energy.

Danilov glanced up at the sky, where he could see the flickering wings of light of the Gundam that his men called Midnight, doing battle with the wings of the Crusader. A battle of good and evil. He was starting to miss those.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Nathaniel Hatias watched with crossed arms as his men eased the mighty Aristotle towards the water's surface. There was a huge, long, dark shape visible up ahead against the sun; it was that gigantic Earth Alliance battleship, the Charlemagne, the Phantom Pain flagship that was leading this assault. With all that firepower, it wouldn't take long to break through Gigafloat's defenses— unless they did something about it. And as loaded as they were with evacuees, there was little they could do...

"Depth is one hundred meters," the diving officer announced. "Ninety, eighty, seventy, sixty..." Nathaniel tensed as his ship neared the surface. "Breaching the surface now— "

"Missiles, fire!"

The Aristotle launched a cloud of missiles into the sky, and they immediately arced downward towards the surprised Charlemagne. The black warship's CIWS emplacements roared to life and spat a torrent of bullets into the oncoming missiles— but enough made it through to slam into the Charlemagne's armor, throw off the ship's aim, and send its salvo of blazing beam shots sailing wide of Gigafloat.

"Mobile suits, launch!" barked Nathaniel. "Don't give them a chance to retaliate!"

The Aristotle's mobile suits roared out of the vertical catapults and stormed into battle, and the Charlemagne's own black Windams scrambled to put themselves between their mothership and the attackers. Nathaniel frowned at the sight— they had reacted quicker than he'd expected.

"Helm, move us directly under their hull and keep us there," he said. "We'll bring them down yet!"

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The ZAKU went flailing back towards Gigafloat from a hard bazooka shell hit to the shield, and Elijah groaned as he struggled for control over his reeling mobile suit. Kaite's combat lessons were really not helping him out here against an entire fleet. The ZAKU slammed back down into the platform; Elijah struggled to put the ZAKU up on its feet, but his blood went cold as he looked up and saw a Windam sweeping down with its beam rifle trained on his cockpit—

...and an instant later, something black and orange lunged out of nowhere and slammed headlong into the Windam. The Alliance mobile suit struggled for a moment, but two enormous fangs went smashing straight through its body, and then pulled back out and let the ruined machine topple into the ocean, leaving Elijah to stare in disbelief at Andrew Bartfeldt's custom BuCUE, standing tall against the attackers.

"Kisato?" Elijah sputtered. "I thought you weren't coming out here!"

"There's no need to put my number one fan in harm's way!" answered George Glenn's voice. Elijah blinked and looked back up— where the yellow Civilian Astray was still doing battle with the Windams aboard its Guul— and then back down at the BuCUE.

"Wait, how— "

"Multiple receptors, silly!" George admonished. "Hey!"

Elijah snapped his attention over his shoulder, where another Windam was coming down— just in time to see something slam into it and send it staggering into the sea, and the ReHOME's bright orange Works GINN stomped out of a warehouse with a linear rifle in hand.

"Why, at this rate I can control a whole army!" George laughed. "We'll see if I'm as great a general as I was an ace pilot! It'll be fun!"

Elijah painfully put the ZAKU back on its feet and looked back towards the enemy forces, still on the move and still undeterred by the wall of firepower Gigafloat's defenders had thrown into the air. A whole army might be what they'd need.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Frustration billowed up from Athrun Zala's heart as he frantically worked on the final touches of the Celestial Justice Gundam's operating system. Unfortunately, "final touches" included important parts without which the Gundam's response time and information systems would be unacceptably slow, and that would probably just get him killed.

But in practical terms, that meant he, and the other new Gundams with the same problem, couldn't be out in the battle.

It was all the more frustrating because while Athrun had always been adequate in working with computers, it had been Kira who had truly mastered them. Athrun could build the computer just fine, but Kira had always been the one who could program it, finding flaws and errors and bad code with preternatural precision and speed. He had singlehandedly completed the Strike Gundam's operating system in the middle of battle— although it helped that Miguel had been something of an idiot about that— and he'd written the M1 Astray's OS and the Strike's later Natural-friendly system almost from scratch.

And, naturally, that meant he was now an enemy and completely inaccessible for finishing this damned thing.

He wiped his brow and took a moment to take stock of everybody through his Newtype senses. Frustration seemed to be the common denominator, but as he passed over the silent Aurora Gundam and its cranky occupant, he felt it bubble up again inside himself and send him plunging back into work. He had something to return to, and damned if an incomplete OS was going to keep that from happening.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Ivan Danilov clenched his fists around the armrests of the Charlemagne's captain's chair as his warship shook. Those missiles were punching through his ship's laminated armor, the smoke and impacts obscured his vision and distracted his men from their real mission, and they were starting to interfere with the weapons systems. At this point they would probably have to pull back, but first...

"Enemy submarine's MS squadrons have been forced back to Gigafloat," the sensor officer reported. "Another missile wave, sir."

Danilov frowned as the CIWS cut them out of the sky. "Gottfrieds, aim at the space just above the submarine and fire— now!"

The Charlemagne's guns obligingly sent a volley of green beams lancing by over the Aristotle's hull, just as another missile salvo lifted off. The explosion shoved the Aristotle backwards and left the upper side of the hull a blackened, mangled mess. The massive submarine began to back up in the water, still launching missiles out of its remaining tubes, and the mobile suits descended down over the ship to cover its retreat.

Danilov sat back and rubbed the side of his head. "Vera. Damage report."

"Damage level B along the ventral side, six CIWS emplacements knocked out, and five hull breaches. One of them is very close to Levitator C."

Danilov held back a smile. Providence had intervened. "They'd blow us out of the sky like that," he grumbled, and keyed in a frequency on his intercom. "Admiral Krane, this is Captain Danilov. We've driven off that giant ZAFT submarine, but we've taken serious damage ourselves. We'll have to withdraw."

Krane scowled back. "You'll be throwing off our entire timetable."

"They've come very close to knocking out my levitator. One more hit and I'll lose altitude, and that'll be the end of our timetable anyway." Danilov shrugged. "Plus you would have to help defend my ship as we get the auxiliary units online."

"Very well," said Krane with a sigh, "just keep the barrage up to open lines in the enemy defense as you pull back. We're on the cusp of victory, captain."

Danilov looked back towards Gigafloat— and beyond, to the small armada of ships and planes racing away, to the west, towards Africa. "Understood. Danilov, out."

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The Blue Frame Second Revise backed away from its sub-wing riding foe and abandoned the shattered remnants of its shield. The bazooka that the Regen Duel carried was stronger than Gai had remembered.

The orange and white mobile suit feinted to the left, then darted to the right and showered the Blue Frame with beam and railgun fire. Gai threw the Blue Frame down below the blasts and opened fire with the Tactical Arms' Gatling gun; the bullets bounced harmlessly off the Phase Shift armor as the Regen Duel whirled around and fired back with its beam rifle. Gai switched his own beam rifle to the Blue Frame's left hand to draw a beam saber with the right— just as the Regen Duel holstered its railgun and drew a saber of its own. The two mobile suits plunged together and their sabers clashed in a blinding display of sparks.

With a start, the Regen Duel charged forward and flung the Blue Frame back— and then abruptly dropped down, flipped over, and rocketed away.

Gai blinked in surprise. "Retreating...? What...?"

Elijah's face suddenly appeared on the auxiliary screen. "Gai, the ReHOME is about to leave. Malchio's sending us out. It's time for us to go."

"He's giving up already?" Gai glanced down dubiously towards Gigafloat. "The battle isn't lost yet."

"He's insisting," Elijah answered, "and he wants us to get as far away as possible, as fast as possible. You've got to come back."

Gai opened his mouth to speak again— but then something else occurred to him. "Is he...?"

"Yes."

"I...I see." The Blue Frame rocketed back down towards Gigafloat. "Very well. Get everyone aboard and we'll get going."

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

"The civilians and Resistance personnel are evacuated," Malchio said sternly. "The soldiers are retreating. The mass driver is clear, but our window of opportunity is running short. It is time for you to go."

Meyrin sat in shock in the captain's chair. "Father, you can't seriously expect us to abandon you here!"

"You must— "

"We won't! You don't have to do this!" She waved a hand at the crew. "We can take you with us! You can help us more when we reach space!"

Malchio's brow furrowed. "Captain Hawke," he said, with an edge in his voice that she had never heard before, "we do not have the luxury of time to discuss this further. I will say this once more. You have to go to space. Take up Lacus Clyne's mantle. Become a force for the human race's salvation. End this war before it consumes the world. I will send you to space, but I cannot do that if we spend so much time arguing that our window of opportunity closes. Now go, before the Alliance fleet damages the mass driver."

Meyrin pushed back a tear. "Father, they're going to kill you and take Gigafloat for themselves."

"No, they won't."

"How are you going to stop them?"

Malchio sat back. "That is not your concern. Promise me, Captain Hawke."

"Father— "

"Promise me!"

His words rang through the silent bridge, and Meyrin finally swallowed the lump in her throat. "A-Alright," she said, "but— "

"That is enough for me," Malchio said, and the screen went dark.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The Gundam Eclipse somersaulted over its adversaries and then ducked aside from a wave of beam fire. Emily glared up at her foes— but the Crusader, Vanguard, and Artemis were rocketing away, and in their place were a quartet of charging white and blue Jet Striker Windams.

"Where are they going?" she mumbled, and then charged towards the Windams. The Alliance mobile suits broke ranks, but the Eclipse dove down into them anyway and sawed the first one in two with her beam sword. The second lunged up behind her, beam rifle leveled at her exposed back; she whipped around and slammed her left-hand claw clear through its cockpit, then hurled the rest of the machine towards the sea. The other two Windams opened fire; the Eclipse danced effortlessly through their blasts and then spiraled back up towards them. They both backed away, fear rippling out of the cockpits; Emily charged forward and slashed them both in two as they tried to evade.

"Emily!" Roxy's voice spoke up. "The hell are you still doing up there? Get back here, we're about to launch on the mass driver!"

Emily blinked. "The mass driver? We're evacuating?"

"Yeah, now hurry up!"

"But— Malchio! Gigafloat! What about— "

"Now is not the time for questions, Emily," Meyrin's voice interrupted— and Emily almost heard the sound of tears behind her words. "Get back here. Now."

Emily stared down at Gigafloat desolately for a moment. Malchio was still down there; she could feel the tiny soothing pinpoint of his presence somewhere in the bowels of the platform. And they were leaving without him.

But he would want her to go. He would want her to find her destiny.

She swallowed her tears and rocketed back towards the Minerva.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The conn was silent as the line went dead from the Proto Abyss. Nathaniel Hatias closed his eyes. This battle had seen sacrifices enough— and it wasn't done yet.

"C-Captain," one of the officers said, "we're...we're out of enemy range."

Nathaniel let out a breath and shoved down his emotions. Alec and the others could be grieved later. The sacrificing was not yet done, but with the Aristotle brimming with refugees and equipment, and with a convoy to protect and a destination to reach, there was work yet to be done to make sure that those sacrifices were not in vain. Alec had not died so that the Aristotle could be sunk here.

They had to go. He knew that. These refugees would need protection from what would surely be Alliance retaliation later. The Aristotle could provide that, and he himself could provide leadership to Gigafloat's dazed and demoralized surviving staff.

But the war had to go elsewhere. The Minerva would go there, and Alec had died to see to that. They would go to ZAFT and destroy the lunatics that had taken over the Coordinators' fury and turned it towards genocide. They would make everything right.

It was bittersweet, almost. These bedraggled Resistance fighters had spent three years in the mud and chaos of the Earth Sphere, and they had looked to their faith in the Minerva to somehow lift them from despair. Eventually they would be delivered from their suffering. And yet here he was, Nathaniel Hatias, former officer of ZAFT, left with only that faith to sustain him.

"Activate the silent drive," he ordered. "We are leaving."

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

Admiral Krane pointed furiously at the rattling mass driver and its steadily accelerating occupant. "I don't care what it takes!" he barks. "Stop them! Bomb the track!"

The fleet's guns boomed and the shells slammed down into the platform, but the mass driver roared and with a mighty blast of exhaust, the Minerva rocketed into the air and spread its wings.

Krane slammed a fist down onto the armrest. "Dammit!"

"Sir," the Farragut's captain spoke up, "the Perry is reporting in. Enemy action around Gigafloat has ceased." He gestured tentatively towards Gigafloat, framed by the setting sun amid the fiery sky. "We won."

The admiral took a moment to let out a sigh. "Yes," he said, "I suppose we did." He stood up. "Move the fleet forward to begin securing the platform. We've got quite a prize for Lord Djibril— "

The admiral and the bridge went silent as the auxiliary screens flickered to life— to reveal the pale-skinned blind man with a cane, standing in an empty control room. Krane frowned.

"Are you surrendering?" he asked.

The Reverend Malchio smiled. "I am doing no such thing, Admiral Krane," he said. "But first, I wish to congratulate you on your victory."

"Fine lot of nerve you've got," Krane sneered. "Consider yourself under arrest by the Earth Alliance for harboring Coordinators and Resistance forces. You've got a lot of evil to answer for, preacher."

Malchio did not so much as flinch. "Evil? I don't think you are the one best suited to accuse me of evil, admiral. The Earth Alliance has persecuted an entire people for their genes and oppressed the entire world. And you have served them loyally and enthusiastically. I am a man of God, admiral. I can't simply stand by and let such things happen without doing anything to interfere."

Krane scoffed. "My men are already on their way to take you down. You can't do anything now. Save your self-righteous speech for someone else."

Malchio raised his left hand— and revealed the cylindrical detonator within it. Krane felt his blood freeze in his veins. "On the contrary, admiral," he said. "In my life I have been entrusted with things that I was told must not fall into the hands of those with evil intent." He smiled. "And while it breaks my heart to do this, I will have to answer for it to a far higher authority than you. But I believe that God will understand the steps I am taking."

The bridge was silent. Krane's jaw dropped as he remembered what else lurked inside Gigafloat's holds. He sprang forward. "All ships, destroy Gigafloat! Target the platform! Kill him! Kill him!"

Malchio raised the detonator high. "I should like to leave you with a quote, gentlemen. A quote for those who would oppress and persecute to keep in mind, no matter where they may do their evil in our war-torn world."

The fleet's guns boomed again, the missiles rained down, explosions ripped across the surface of Gigafloat— but only a brief burst of static ripped across Malchio's image.

"Find him!" Krane shrieked.

"'Even as I have seen,'" said Malchio, "'they that plow iniquity, and sow wickedness, reap the same.'"

"Land the troops!" Krane screamed. "Target the core! Target everything! Now!"

"'By the blast of God they perish,'" Malchio's voice rang out.

Krane looked up in horror as Malchio held the detonator high.

"'And by the breath of His nostrils are they consumed.'"

Malchio pressed the button, and the world went white.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —

The bridge of the Minerva was silent as the mushroom cloud bubbled up beneath them, far below. The shockwave followed, but it was almost unnoticeable at this altitude, with the ship moving at escape velocity and the engines running at full burn.

But the shockwave still echoed inside Meyrin Hawke's head and rattled her soul. She bowed her head and made no attempt to hide her tears.

And the Minerva soared into space.

— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —